Barstool Sports founder in mayor’s race

While David Portnoy’s site has plenty of humor, he’s says his candidacy for Boston mayor is serious (Published Thursday, Feb. 20, 2014)

(NECN: Greg Wayland, Boston) - "Well, you know, I've been thinking about it for a long time.”

And now, flip flops firmly planted under his highly caffeinated, hopelessly cluttered workspace just over the Boston border in Milton, Mass, the man known to his fans as "El Prez." The blogosphere pioneer who brought you Barstool Sports, the Barstool Booze Cruise, and the Barstool Blackout Tour.

One young female Northeastern student named Sarah had a typical reaction. "Are you serious? He's running for mayor? That's hilarious."

Northeastern professor and media analyst Dan Kennedy said, "I have to tell you, I assumed it was gag."

"I'm the opposite of political,” Portnoy said. “I have no experience. never done it. just kind of jumped in."

And he hopes multitudes of his mostly young supporters, many of them college students, might jump on his bandwagon. I guess you could call this, his base.

They already flock in droves to his popular, decidedly controversial Barstool Sports blog.

"If you want to go through the web site, you're gonna find a lot of things I said would be like, 'this guy, he's the devil!'But the devil he says he's after -- probably his main issue -- is an urban bureaucracy of permits and regulations -- he says it's the worst he's encountered --and drag on nightlife, a wet blanket on the economy.

"So when Menino said he wasn't running, you know, we sort of mentioned it on jest ---'I should run'. and a lot of people are, like, you know, you really should."

A University of Michigan graduate with a degree in education, a political Libertarian, he says he's boning up on other issues, like crime and schools.

"And I don't want to sit here and really say that I've studied every issue. because I haven't...,” he said.

Election paraphernalia is limited at the moment to a t-shirt with an iconic face

"A face that I've become famous for on our web site is prep school face."

He's got a campaign manager, and is shopping for a campaign headquarters. One politically astute Bostonian, told about Portnoy's candidacy, commented, resignedly:

"There's about 20,000 people running for mayor of Boston at the moment."